Romney illegal foreign campaign donations

It would appear Mitts world tour garnered him some shady funding from foreign investors who remain hidden in the shadows. It is fairly illegal for any
presidential candidate to prostitute themselves to foreign countries... much like it's illegal for a foreign born citizen to hold the office of
president.

"No other American presidential candidate has ever left the US to garner campaign contributions from foreign citizens.
There is a reason for this, one that Romney and his staff seem oblivious to and the mainstream media had ignored until just recently.
Using foreign contributions in any American election is a felony."

It seems strange that his tour was widely publicized yet no main stream media mentioned the legality of such fundraising save for a small mention on
Faux News.

He'll probably just say it was from Americans Abroad. They are still allowed to make political donations even if they are not home in the states. I
have family in the military and they are not all stationed here on American soil. Some are overseas and have just as much right to participate in
democracy as everyone else. I would argue more so seeing as they are the ones defending everyone elses rights in the first place. They are the reason
why we even have a democracy still.

I don't think I've had a chance to thank you in a while. You brought up the key point. No matter how many assumptions, and how much inflamed
rhetoric was used, I didn't see anywhere in the article "Sam Smith, a citizen from somewhere else donated a bazillion dollars to the Romney
campaign. This was verified by ????"

This seems, until I can find some evidence, to be another in the: Romney traded illegally, Romney ate a dog (oh, wait), Romney uses toxic chemicals in
his hair, Romney makes out with his wife's horse, kind of story.

No other American presidential candidate has ever left the US to garner campaign contributions from foreign citizens.

There is a reason for this, one that Romney and his staff seem oblivious to and the mainstream media had ignored until just recently.

Using foreign contributions in any American election is a felony. Hello Romney campaign…is anybody home, hello?

Both Romney and Obama raised funds from Americans living overseas, which is legal. Romney is the only that may have crossed the line by raising funds
from non-American citizens. He held secret fund-raising meetings with overseas contributors, many of whom are not American citizens, and kept the
reporters and cameras out. He also refuses to disclose who attended the meetings and who contributed to him. Obama has disclosed all his fundraising
events, who attended and who contributed (see Fox video)

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the hunt for campaign money, no distance is too far to travel, especially when the race between President Barack Obama and
Mitt Romney is tight and likely to stay that way into the fall.

The Democratic president and his Republican challenger have been aggressively courting Americans living abroad at fundraisers held far beyond U.S.
shores. Such efforts serve the dual purpose of raising money to pay for what may be the most expensive election in U.S. history, and galvanizing a
largely untapped group of eligible voters.

The practice is legal and has been used for decades, said former Federal Election Commission Chairman David Mason.

One of Romney's London
fundraisers raised eyebrows because the guest list included executives from Barclays, which recently admitted that bank employees were involved in
manipulating a key market index.

But did Barclays British execs donate to Romney?

A separate well of potential donors awaited Romney in Israel, the second stop on the former Massachusetts governor's three-country tour. But
there too Romney attracted some unwanted attention when his campaign announced it would break with its own precedent by barring reporters from
covering a fundraiser at a swanky Jerusalem hotel.

How bad is the Citizens United decision? We're still seeing the ill-effects of the worst SCOTUS decision in decades. Thank your corporate masters for
this one:

Election law experts have warned that the proliferation of super PACs has made it impossible to tell whether foreign cash is flowing to the
campaigns. The foreign money ban also applies to super PACs, but some of their money comes from vague corporate entities, obscuring the original
funding source.

Two percent of the money super PACs raised this year came in the form of so-called "secret money" that can't be reasonably traced, according to a
preliminary analysis from an upcoming report by Demos and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group. In addition to super PACs, nonprofit groups are
also spending heavily on the 2012 race, campaign finance experts said, and those groups aren't required to disclose their donors as long as their
political activities stay within certain limits.

"As long as there is secret money sloshing around in our national elections, the public simply has no way of knowing if illegal foreign money is
working its way into influencing our presidential and congressional races," said Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21, which advocates for campaign
finance reform.

This seems to be a lot like the tax return matter. In both cases people are saying "There may be evidence of wrongdoing, but we don't know because
the person we suspect isn't giving us the evidence." I think that's a fair way to express it.

Given that's the case, what should our response be? Should we say, "He's a criminal and should not be allowed to run?" Should we say "We just
can't know for sure, it looks liked we're blocked on this particular matter, let's try some other issue?" Or, perhaps "Let's just keep saying
this over and over, it's our patriotic duty to keep him out?"

The rules are well-established for lobbyist donations to the DNC and for the Presidential nominee[34]. Obama does accept money from lobbyists
who do not do business with the federal government and he also accepts money from spouses and family members of lobbyists. And the DNC ban is also not
retroactive, which means the DNC will keep lobbyist and PAC contributions it received earlier in the election cycle. Retroactive period being the date
Barack Obama started his campaign, February 10, 2007. The DNC possibly the day after the November 2006 Congressional elections until June 5th, 2008.
In addition, Barack Obama's ban does not apply to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee nor to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign
Committee. Unlike John McCain, Barack Obama has not disclosed the lobbyists working in his campaign.

President Obama’s health care law and the 2009 stimulus have provided money to groups pushing for tax increases on soda and price controls
for other unhealthy foods, despite laws against taxpayer-funded lobbying of lawmakers.

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